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IN EARLY 2004, the then Scottish administration headed by Jack McConnell withdrew funding from an adventure training initiative designed to instil discipline and self-esteem in young repeat offenders. The youths were given a choice of serving their sentences or undergoing the rigorous training and outward bound course known as the Airborne Initiative.
The initiative had a reasonable track record of success in terms of reducing reoffending, and at least offered a positive approach to dealing with youth crime. However, the McConnell administration panicked after a BBC documentary showed youths on the programme drinking and taking drugs. The decision to axe the GBP 600,000 funding, with the loss of 26 jobs, was short-sighted and split the administration's Lib Dem colleagues. Some on the Labour benches realised they had made a mistake, but the administration was too embarrassed to admit it.
To their credit, the opposition parties - SNP, Tories and Greens - were against the ending of the Airborne Initiative. Nationalist Fergus Ewing pointed to the success of similar schemes, particularly Operation Youth Advantage (OYA), a five-day residential course that has been run by the army at Cameron Barracks, near Fort George, for the past ten years. OYA targets those aged 15 to 17 who have been involved in minor offending, aiming to deflect them from acquiring a criminal record in the first place.
Yesterday, Fergus Ewing - now the community safety minister in the...